Role of SWAYAM in Transforming on Higher Education in India

Abstract

Under the ‘Digital India’ Initiative of Government of India, one of the thrust area is ‘Massive Online Open Courses’(MOOCs) have developed gradually as a new prototype that is change radically conventional methods of teaching and learning. The HRD ministry of India have taken the initiatives by launching ‘SWAYAM’ (Study Webs of Active-learning for Young Aspiring Minds), a platform for quality education. It is inexpensive and self-learning is productive not only for enrolled but also for professionals and dropouts. It will provide great interest among student which will help them in learning many ideas through interactive-audio-visual teaching contents.

It also supplies worth and affordable education to its citizens, which can be accessible on an anywhere, anytime basis. SWAYAM is a Web portal where Massive Open On-line Courses (MOOCs) will be accessible on all kinds of subjects. It is a portal which has been created as a remedy to the problem of tedious access to physical educational infrastructure and teachers along with study material and textbooks.

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In country like India where the growing major part of humans resides in rural areas and people can’t give money for to get quality education. This MOOC course swayam portal will begin to be game changer. This will be cost effective way of through online medium definitely possess a bright future in India. SWAYAM is an Information Technology platform which will host Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) and provide high quality education on various subjects from school level--class 9-12 to Under Graduate and Post Graduate students-- covering all disciplines.

This paper aims to discuss the concept of Swayam, its significance of transforming to higher education in India.

Keywords: SWAYAM, MOOCs, Digital India, Information Technology

Introduction

SWAYAM has become an emerging boon and being a great milestone with plathora of knowlegde for the new-vibrant and enthusiastic India, where self paced learning is not only a bonus for students but also for working people and home executives as well. The gain of this can go to the rural lands of our India where the Agriculture can also be brought to the next level with teaching of the better ways to the Farmers. This depends upon the Internet Connectivity and the Indian Government has alsready started the work of Connecting India. The world is being ruled with the Online Courses such as EdX, Coursera, Udemy, Open2Study and many with the evolution of them in the recent decade. SWAYAM can bring oor nation in the front of Digital Learning with our Digital India. The day is not too far away when the Online courses are going to shine and the make the curriculum more interesting to make the country sound well educated and technologically strong. The MOOCs (Massic Open Online Courses) shall be transforming into MOOPs (Massive Open Online Programmes) where accredited degrees will also be given. It looks like a dream now. The challenges of resources and scarcity of teachers can be handled with the online teachings. The people will get their awareness levels increased to a good level with the online tutorials.

MOOC, EduSoMedia, EdTech etc. have developed significantly in the last few decades. The definition of Education Technology has got evolved over time. There is a new call for Collaborative Learning where the participative and interative teaching and learning happens. India's own philosophy is being the Education Technology now. One have been practicing Eklavya’s concept of learning with the ‘Teacher’s Presence’ in one’s life, not just in the class-room. It is believed that Eklavyaismcan better be related to MOOCs where the presence of the teacher is no necessarily required. Self-enabled learned learn by themselves.

Literature Review

The term “MOOC” was coined in 2008 by Canadian academician named David Cormier whereas first MOOC was taught by George Siemens and Stephen Downes in University of Manitoba, Canada where a class of 25 regular students was extended online to teach 1500 students [1]. Various Universities worldwide has put their courses online by setting up open learning platforms, such as edX. Commercial start-ups such as Coursera and Udacity have also been launched in collaboration with prestigious universities, offering online courses for free or charging a small fee for certification [2]. The Technical University of Munich (TUM) in Germany launched the first ‘TUM MOOCs’ initiative in 2013 with €250,000 for production and delivery of five courses in cooperation with Coursera and edX platforms [3]. With the objective of developing indigenous platform for SWAYAM (India MOOCs) ministry floated a global tender. After several rounds of tendering and failing to identify a qualified bidder, the Ministry finally entrusted the task to All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE). AICTE in collaboration with Microsoft and its software partner WizIQ developed and made live the Beta version of the site on August 15, 2016. This was done in a record time of merely four months. The indigenously developed SWAYAM platform is expected to host 2000 courses and 80000 hours of learning: covering school, under-graduate, post-graduate, engineering, law and other professional courses [4]. With the joint activity of the seven IITs (Indian Institute of Technology) and IISc (Indian Institute of Science Bangalore), National Program on Technology Enhanced Learning project emerge and funded by MHRD, started in 2003. And through this activity, it offer online courses and accreditation in different topics related to engineering and science [6]. K-12 School is a terminology used as Kindergarten through XII grade. Various start-up companies have been the contributor for this sector. Today the world is of Y-generation people who are acquainted with the technological developments taking around them, and they are also surrounded with the required skills and abilities. K-12 creates the game based learning environment, which enables the learner to easily get the word of education in India and give us a better self-trained Y generation [5]. SWAYAM - One-stop web and mobile based interactive e-content for all courses from High School to University level. High quality learning experience using multimedia on anytime, anywhere basis. State of the art system that allows easy access, monitoring and certification. Peer group interaction and discussion forum to clarify doubts Hybrid model of delivery that adds to the quality of classroom teaching [7].

SWAYAM

Open Course - Open has multiple meanings in relation to MOOCs. It may refer to access; anyone, no matter his or her background, prior experience or current context may enroll in a MOOC. Open can also refer to cost; that is, a MOOC is available free of charge. A third meaning of open relates to the open nature of knowledge acquisition in a MOOC, including the employment of open educational resources (OER) or Open Course Ware (OCW) which is available under a Creative Commons licence. Open also relates to production of knowledge and the remixing and reuse of the resources opportunity developed during a MOOC by the course advisors and by the learners themselves to create new knowledge.

This courseware can be enhanced through learning style, which incorporates:

• Interaction and collaboration—the social media usage and other interactive forms to stimulate learning independently and learning with peer collaboration.
• Open learning practice—free and open to choose the topics and methods of learning. Help the students to create their own independent path and expertise in their field of interest.
• Game and simulation—learning elements are built on games and simulation. The students can experience the outcome of choices directly and learn from errors.
• Customized learning—instead of one concept to fit all, the creation of individualized and personalized programs for each student is effective.
• Self-study—no more teachers are necessary. All materials and formats are accessible to anyone anytime anywhere; certificates are generated automatically if a student fulfils all learning requirements.